


A Distant Mirage

by HalfshellVenus



Category: Prison Break
Genre: M/M, Male Slash, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-04
Updated: 2016-09-04
Packaged: 2018-08-12 22:38:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7951963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfshellVenus/pseuds/HalfshellVenus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i> Michael is the dream Alex can't stop chasing, even when he's not sure it's actually real.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Distant Mirage

**Author's Note:**

> Set in Season 3, during episode 3x09 ("Boxed In"). This was my Prison Break Fic Exchange Round 6 story for itsirtou, who offered a number of slash pairings and the prompts of a shot glass, rain, and Michael's hands. I chose Michael/Mahone as the pairing to stretch myself a little, as well as a slightly different scheme for the story and the added challenge of trying to make the key encounter sexy and enthralling instead of seedy.

x-x-x-x-x

_**~~~~ This Endless Dust ~~~~** _

The sun cuts across the floor, so bright that its light turns to pain-filled spikes against Alex's eyes. He clutches the medallion like a talisman.

Outside, Michael was _outside_ , a shadow in a box under the blazing Panama sky. Alex is fairly certain that was real. He can't imagine what it means– the box is something new, a form of Hell not yet revealed when he left just days ago. 

Escape with Michael and Whistler, that was the plan (and Alex's hope, even if he had to buy his ticket to freedom with the edge of a knife). A detour through the false promise of release in trade for testimony hasn’t changed that: Michael's the key, always the key.

Did something happen while he was away? Is that why Michael's in trouble? Alex can't think with the hammering in his head. His stomach folds on itself, bruised and cramping in a days-old battle just like the one that's ruled the last years of his life. It is a struggle just to find some sense of 'now' – reality is slippery, often dream-driven and unreliable. It could be deadly or simply a lie.

Michael, it all comes down to Michael, and where will it lead? Alex doesn't know Michael's plan, if there actually is one, or how it can possibly work when Michael's sweating his life into the dirt under the deadly midday sun.

_**~~~~ An Oasis Remembered ~~~~** _

Rain drifted across the road in sheets, the kind of sudden late-May storm Chicago was known for. Alex didn't mind.

At the bar, he watched the water fall in waves, wet enough to soak a man in the time it took for the 'Walk' light to change over. He'd been there half-an-hour, trying to come down from the rush of his most recent collar. The Bureau already had something new for him back in New York; he'd leave on the red-eye that night at ten. 

The door opened as the storm chased someone inside. Black trenchcoat, and the guy was already taking it off to reveal a charcoal suit underneath that hung like money on his elegant not-too-slender frame. He had the most intense eyes Alex had ever seen on anyone who wasn't crazy, and the next thoughts after that were about lips and temptation and the kinds of things Alex had sworn he'd never let himself be pulled into again.

When the man spoke just two feet away, the battle was already over: that voice was sex-in-the-shadows, silk sheets and firelight, the beginning of damning and convoluted lies. 

"Vodka-tonic, with a twist." The sound was like flowing honey.

"This one's on me," Alex offered, and the answering smile was the confirmation he was looking for.

The man said his name was Martin, though it probably wasn't. Alex used his real name, his _first_ name, because he had no history in this town and no future either. He was just passing through, another crime story in a nationwide itinerary that never ended.

"Martin" was something like an architect, recently graduated and working for one of the big downtown firms. It was engineering really, but with some combination of physics and artistry that made the man's eyes light up when he described it, and Alex had never wished so badly that he understood any part of theoretical math. 

When it came time to describe himself, he went with "behaviorist."

"Is that like psychology?" the young man asked.

"A lot of it has its roots in psychology," Alex answered truthfully. "But it focuses more on larger behaviors and how they turn up in individuals instead of the other way around." He shrugged. "Though basic psychology is still fun..."

"Such as?" The man's smile was teasing, and Alex wanted so badly to get underneath that confident veneer. 

"Well you, for instance," Alex said softly. "You think with your hands."

The man looked downward, acknowledging the cocktail napkin he'd absentmindedly converted into intricate folds. "So it would seem," he laughed in apparent surprise.

"It's not uncommon, among engineers and artists." _And you're a little of both, I think_. "Or Italians," Alex added for the benefit of humor. 

"Like Leonardo da Vinci. He was all three of those things."

God, that intelligence just made the man _sexier_. The thought curled down inside Alex, warm and tempting, and he shifted his stance guiltily to accommodate it. Even though he'd opened that door, he'd been hoping to keep from stepping through it. He had a life— a wife— back home, and he hadn't slipped up in _years_. 

But he could already feel the possibility of all that changing...

"Are you from Chicago originally?" He wanted to move away from intellectual topics— maybe the mundane would dull the man's charm.

"Born and raised." The voice was a purr, and just like that Alex was swept up in it all over again. "How about you?"

There was a question _under_ the question, and Alex heard both, gave the answer that was true and just maybe showed they were looking for the same thing that night: "Just passing through. Flying out later, in fact, in about four hours."

Martin smiled. "Is that so." He finished his drink swiftly and put the glass on the counter. "I need to use the restroom." He half-glanced backward and moved off casually, underlying grace evident in every self-assured step.

Alex turned back toward the bar, tried to drink slowly while looking around with feigned interest in everything nearby. He counted to four hundred before setting down his glass and heading to the bathroom himself.

When he opened the door, Martin was alone, washing his hands slowly at the sink and clearly taking his time. A single look passed between them, confirmation turning into heat, and then Alex bolted the door and pushed the man up against the nearest wall.

He tasted like sex and promise with a sharp, citrus tang that electrified the kiss, made it that much more immediate and _real_. It was like drowning, the roar inside Alex's head as he stroked his tongue into the velvety smoothness of Martin's mouth. He pressed all along the length of the man, rolling his hips and meeting hardness that made him shudder with wanting all of it and right that minute and _more_.

_Oh, god—_

Alex kissed his way along the man's neck, sucking on the skin angling below the ear and hearing Martin gasp unevenly in response. _So fucking hot_. The sound just made Alex want to hear more, made him want to go right to his knees and—

_his cheeks burned with the shame of even thinking it—_

but then a hand slid between them and the impulse was lost to distraction. Martin rubbed Alex coaxingly through the fabric of his dress pants, a long twist and pull shorting out every thought but _Yes, just like that._ Scattered seconds later Alex returned the favor, one hand stroking along the smooth silk of the man while the other ran up Martin's side, feeling lightly muscled heat waiting underneath.

They turned to accommodate each other then, both gasping through broken kisses as they leaned together side-by-side, their backs against the door. Clinking glasses and the murmur of conversation seeped through, reminders of the danger of being discovered. Alex bit Martin's lip in response to the sudden thrill that ran through him at that thought, his hand working swift and sure to match Martin's own. He was on the verge of dropping to the floor and swallowing Martin down, all self-respect forgotten, when a surge of slick warmth spilled out into his hand. The man's hips jerked and he groaned against Alex's mouth, the sound muffled— felt but not heard. The vibrations from it shuddered through Alex, and then a sudden sharp twist of Martin's thumb kicked him unexpectedly over the edge: "Yes, oh god yes, _ohhhh!_ " 

They cleaned up afterward, Alex shaking inside with the realization of what he'd done. The man kissed him one last lingering time— his lips so soft, and Alex thought he'd never forget the shape of them, not in a million years— and then murmured "Thank you" before unlocking the door and stepping through it.

He didn't look back as he went, never saw Alex watching him with something like desperation in his eyes…

_**~~~~ Prevailing Winds ~~~~** _

Ten years later, when a new assignment arrived involving a prison escape in Chicago, Alex recognized Martin immediately from the mug shot. He was less shocked to learn the man's real name was _Michae_ l than to find he'd become some sort of criminal mastermind in the interim.

Just looking at Michael's picture brought everything back, every aspect of that tailored-suit encounter in that Chicago bar. Alex could smell the pheromone-laden scent of Michael's neck, feel that urge again to abandon his own dignity before a stranger, hear the sound of the rain on the roof drowning out their breathless pleas. It had been so intense, so _perfect_ on so many levels, with Michael's intelligence like a mirror of his own. It could also very well have become Alex's downfall, so nearly _did_. The slightest promise from Michael, and he would have given it all away, forsaken Pamela and his future for that glimpse of something like the echo of his very soul. 

He'd never wanted to know that about himself.

It made him vengeful, knowing how easily Michael had nearly destroyed him back then, all the while hiding his true nature like a wolf in sheep's clothing.

It seemed fitting that Alex return the favor…

_**~~~~ The Desert Expanse ~~~~** _

Alex is cold, shivering despite what has to be ungodly heat. By late afternoon SONA is a furnace, its own corner of Hell.

 _This is where I belong_.

The last two days have been spent trapped between the conflicting poles of his conscience and his dreams. He knows what he wishes for… and he also knows what he deserves. Neither half will stay silent.

He wants to be free again, back with Pamela and Cameron. It's a fantasy that he could, that they'd even _want_ him after all he's done— that the blackmail past would ever truly relinquish him. 

He also wants Michael. Not here in SONA, but if it has to be here then Michael would make all the difference, would make the nightmare bearable. Alex knows the truth now, of who Michael really is, _what_ he is. The straight-arrow background before the bank robbery was the reality— it was Michael's desperation to save his railroaded brother that drove the rest.

Alex had assumed Burrows was guilty, though his assignment hadn't been justice back then. Thanks to the hold the Company had had on him, Alex had followed orders regardless of the human cost. But with the unfolding of the enigma that was Michael and his engineered escape, Alex began to form a context for those scattered pieces. In the end, it was the story of a man who was willing to do nearly anything for the sake of his family, a man whose underlying kindness and compassion would not prevent him from becoming ruthless and calculated if the situation required it.

He and Michael are more alike than Alex first realized that day they met. But he's the only one of them that sees it.

With everything that's happened between them along the way, Alex knows how dim his chances of having Michael actually are. He'd be lucky at this point to simply have Michael stop hating him. 

They've never talked about that day in Chicago. Either Michael doesn't remember (which surely can't be true, that a moment so earth-shattering for Alex could be so forgettable for Michael?), or he doesn't want to admit it ever happened. Alex can still taste the flavor of Michael's kiss, how the memory of it made him push Michael back against the wall in that SONA cell. Michael trembled under his touch then— just like before, Alex's mind whispers, though the reasons that second time were different. Pulled in by Michael all over again, Alex found himself caught between coercing Michael into including him in the escape, and the raw impulse to just devour Michael's neck and the rest of him along with it, right there and then. _God, yes_. 

Those images take the edge off the cold sweat of withdrawal, and a welcome heat begins pooling below Alex's stomach. Just the two of them, if only…

If only Alex didn't, hadn't, _wasn't_. But he is. 

He can't change it any more than he can make Michael forget it. 

Not being left behind is the most Alex can hope for— it's the one thing he can't lose sight of or it will happen while his back is turned. He has to keep his eyes on Michael, on the promise of escape that glimmers like a mirage in the most godforsaken desert. 

A clanging outside his cell forces his attention back to his surroundings. It's later now, hours since he returned, and where is Michael? Michael who was trapped in that box out under the lethal force of the sun? 

_"Michael!"_

Alex struggles to his feet, his legs rubbery beneath him as he goes in search of his only remaining chance for freedom. _Please let the box be an illusion_. He stumbles from cell to corridor to balcony, hoping that Michael's still alive, that it isn't too late.

It was always about Michael, always will be so long as Alex is in SONA. But he knows now that he's got to keep his head clear enough to think past his daydreams or the next high, and protect his future and savior both. 

The longer Alex looks without finding Michael, the faster and more frenzied the search grows as the panic builds. There are too many roads to despair for a man like Alex. 

There are too many ways for Michael to leave him behind.

 

_\----- fin -----_


End file.
